


What He Would Do

by authoressjean



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Dean Winchester is Sam Winchester's Parent, Demon Blood, Demon Blood Addict Sam Winchester, Detoxing, Episode AU: s15e08 Our Father Who Aren't In Heaven, Episode: s15e08 Our Father Who Aren't In Heaven, Gen, Guilty Dean Winchester, Hurt Sam Winchester, Hurt/Comfort, Protective Dean Winchester, Sam Winchester Detoxing From Demon Blood, Season/Series 15, Trauma From Lucifer's Cage (Supernatural)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-12
Updated: 2020-06-16
Packaged: 2021-03-04 03:40:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 10,427
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24687025
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/authoressjean/pseuds/authoressjean
Summary: AU of 15x08: Lilith catches both Winchesters and offers Sam a choice, per Chuck's orders: one of them has to drink demon blood in order to get the apocalypse back on track.Break over ten years of sobriety, or let Dean drink the blood?Sam knows what he'll do. It still doesn't make it any easier.
Relationships: Castiel & Dean Winchester & Sam Winchester, Dean Winchester & Sam Winchester
Comments: 70
Kudos: 272





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Anyone else see Lilith show up and think, "Well that'll be great to see some resolution/reference to Sam's demon blood addiction! ...wait, you're not going to do anything about it? Seriously?"
> 
> So. The demon blood scene and subsequent resolution of sorts that no one probably asked for but y'all are getting anyway. Because dammit season 4 HURT. And season 5's noting of it wasn't much better.
> 
> Also to note: this is me mucking with canon. You know me: I love to mess with canon. However, this fic contains spoilers up to 15x08, so tread with caution.

The warehouse felt just as grimy as it looked. Or maybe it was the slow drip of water that was dropping next to him, the puddles adding a faint odor to the air. Or maybe it was just the chair under Sam, cold and rusty, and it made him want to get up.

Of course, if he could get up, he would. But that was sort of part of the problem.

He pushed against the hold on him again and got absolutely nowhere. Across the room, Dean was plastered against the wall, fighting to get free. He’d cast his gaze at Sam every now and then, but most of his attention stayed on where Sam’s own focus was: Lilith.

Of all the things that Chuck had to bring back, why did it have to be her?

It was their own damn fault they were in their current predicament. The hint of Chuck had been too great to ignore and they’d followed it, even though Castiel had warned them to wait. “We’ll get a lot of people, we’ll take him on together,” Castiel had urged them. “Just _wait_ for me, I think I have a way to bottle Chuck up for good.”

Dean hadn’t been willing to wait. “We’ll just scope it out,” he’d said. “Then we’ll know what we’re dealing with.”

Famous last words, ones that Dean was clearly kicking himself for. _Cas, we’re at the site we told you about,_ Sam prayed again. _Come get us. Hurry._

“You two are so easy, you know that?” Lilith said with glee in her voice. Even knowing that the girl inside was dead, it still made Sam’s heart break to see her strut around in another blonde, wearing her like a cheap dress. “I mean, come on, Chuck would never be so obvious. But it’s not like I don’t know how to pull your strings at this point.”

“Can you just get to the point of what you want?” Sam asked. “Chuck doesn’t want you to kill us. I’m pretty sure that’s how you get a one-way ticket back to the Empty.”

Lilith scoffed. “You should be far more concerned about how much damage I can do without killing you. Especially you. Just because my dying was part of the original plan doesn’t mean I’m thrilled about _you_ , Sammy.”

Dean struggled against the hold again and got absolutely nowhere. Sam just stared her down with disdain. Like anything she could do to him would come close to Lucifer’s level. There were still things that he hadn’t told Dean. He was terrified that one of his nightmares was going to give him away to Dean, tell his big brother everything he didn’t want him to know. So far, his luck had held.

So whatever she could come up with? It was all going to pale in comparison.

Lilith gave him a long, assessing gaze, one that suggested she was thinking similar thoughts. “Well?” Sam asked, raising an eyebrow.

She gave a slow, wide grin. “Lucky for you, I’m not here to hurt you. I’ve got a _much_ better offer on the table. Turns out, Chuck thinks I’m highly qualified to get this story back on track.”

She pulled something silver and shiny out of her back pocket and unscrewed the top, and for a moment, Sam didn’t understand. What the hell did she expect to do with a flask?

Then he realized what was in it, what had to be in it, and his stomach bottomed out. “No,” he whispered.

“Oh, it’s not for you,” Lilith said with a smile. “Not unless you really want it. No, it’s for Dean.”

Sam froze. “So I guess you get to decide, Sam. Who gets the blood? Because Dean won’t be able to fight me in the state he’s in. And I have a _lot_ in here.”

This was worse than death. This was worse than anything Lilith could’ve physically done to him, worse than anything she was doing to Dean. The Hell that was demon blood was never anything he’d ever wanted his brother to endure. _Cas, please, hurry,_ he prayed again. _Oh god please._

Castiel didn’t burst through the door. No one did.

Sam’s chest tightened to the point of pain and his hands shook. But he couldn’t. He _wouldn’t_. Ten-plus years (and several hundred in the Cage but those didn’t really count) sober and the sight of demon blood didn’t incite any want. It only made him nauseated, made his skin crawl. To drink it now, to undo everything he’d fought for, to prove to Dean and Castiel and the world that he really was a monster…

No. He couldn’t.

But to let Dean live that Hell, to taint him, to make him as much of a monster as Sam was…

Sam shut his eyes tight. Because he knew what the answer was, and so did she.

So did Dean, if his brother’s sudden shout was anything to go off of. “Hey! Leave him the hell alone. You want to give me a dose? Whatever. Get it over with.”

“I think Sammy wants it,” she purred. She slowly stalked towards him, waving the flask in front of him like it was a delicious home-baked pie. “Don’t you? Do you remember how good it felt? How _right_?”

“Sam, _no_ ,” Dean said, anger and disgust in his voice. Sam flinched. “Sam!”

“Sammy’s a big boy,” Lilith said. “Mind your business or I’ll give you some, too. Y’know, I have enough in here for both of you. Maybe I should dose the two of you—”

“Wait.”

She stopped from where she’d turned back towards Dean. “Well?” she asked.

He kept his eyes locked on her knees. He couldn’t look at Dean. “Leave him alone,” he whispered.

He could hear the grin in her voice. “Then open up.”

“Sam! Tell her no! _Sam_!” The fury in his voice only grew. “You keep that crap away from him, you bitch, or-“

Sam found his head pulled back, her fingers tight in his hair. Even as he gasped in sudden pain the flask slid between his lips and the blood flowed in.

Oh god it tasted vile, it tasted even worse than the first time he’d had it. He choked on the blood and swallowed on reflex to keep from drowning. “Good boy,” she murmured, her eyes rolling white. “You always did come through in the clutch.”

“I swear when I get out of this, you are so _dead_ you bitch,” Dean seethed, but all Sam could focus on was the blood that wouldn’t stop. He coughed and found more of it sliding down his throat.

His skin felt as if it were on fire, and he was certain he could feel the blood sinking into his veins, filthy and evil and _wrong_. It flooded through him, making every nerve light up. Every part of him that he’d purified with the Trials, every part of him that he’d fought to cleanse, it was all done. Any part of good he’d tried to get back was gone.

His eyes squeezed shut, tears leaking out.

The flask finally hit empty and she pulled it away. He coughed and sputtered, gasping in air desperately, spitting out what little blood remained in his mouth. “Was that so hard?” she asked. “Honestly. It was way easier to make you follow a script before. But hey, I did my part. You two are back on track.”

“You want to elaborate?” Dean said, voice dangerously low. It was the first thing he’d said since Sam had started drinking the blood.

“Simple,” Lilith said. “Either he steps up to the plate and becomes every inch the monster he is, killing you, or you valiantly take him out first, killing him. Either way, my work here is done.”

“It is, yeah.”

She spun around, startled as Sam pushed himself out of the chair. In an instant he had her, hand stretched out. It was so easy to see the smoke inside of her, the plume of evil and wrong, and he caught hold of it. She choked, trying to throw her own hand out.

“Sorry,” he said, and the power surged through him, only pulling on her harder. “You were the one who gave me your blood. And I’m just following the script, remember? You did your part. And now you’re done.”

He tightened harder around her and she began to spark. “No,” she gasped. “No, I’m not going back, no, _no—_ ”

But it was exactly where she was going. With a final tightening of his fist she exploded, burning to nothing but cinders. The host she’d been riding fell to the ground, eyes blank.

Dean tumbled from the wall, free of her hold. He righted himself and stared at Sam, and Sam couldn’t read his brother’s gaze. Anger? Fear? Revulsion? All of them would apply.

God he’d tried, he’d tried so damn hard, but he was never going to be enough. Never going to be anything except this. And in the end, the darkness had come back to claim him.

Something trailed down his chin and he wiped it away with the back of his sleeve. Red stained the fabric, and his stomach churned. He knew what he had to do. But knowing and doing were two separate things.

“Sam—”

The door burst open, and Sam spun to see Castiel, Bobby, and Jody race in. The three slid to a halt, and Castiel’s eyes went wide. Sam stepped back instinctively, feeling as filthy and wrong as he was.

Bobby stared at him too, then glanced over at Dean. In an instant his shotgun came up, straight at Sam’s chest. “Dean, go!” Bobby shouted.

“Wait!” Dean shouted, eyes wide at Sam, but Sam wasn’t waiting. He took off for the other door and cleared it within seconds. The warehouse was on the ground floor and the outside beckoned. The industrial area offered plenty of places to hide as he kept running.

Plenty of glass, too, for him to see his reflection, and he stared in horror.

His lower face and neck were stained with blood that he’d drunk. He looked like he’d eaten someone. He looked like a monster. But it was the eyes that were the worst.

They weren’t black. No, his eyes were milky white. Just like Lilith’s.

Sounds from behind him drew his attention back and he realized he’d stopped. He took off again, the demon blood singing in his veins. He’d find a car, he’d get to where he needed to go.

Then…he’d start trying to convince Dean that he wasn’t a monster. Again.

* * *

“I could’ve had the shot—"

“You touch my brother and it’ll be the last thing you do,” Dean snapped, turning on Bobby. They’d chased Sam outside but his little brother was long gone. To where, he didn’t know.

And Bobby or not, hurting Sam was going to be met with equal amounts of firepower.

Bobby glared at him. “What he is ain’t human.”

“He’s human and _drugged_ ,” Dean said firmly. “She forced demon blood down his throat.”

Castiel gave him a look that was equal parts sorrow and suspicion. “He wouldn’t have taken it willingly, I know that.”

No, only if the choice of drinking it were himself or Dean. And he would’ve done anything to keep Dean safe.

They’d learned to let each other go. Mostly. But the hell that was demon blood, that Sam never would’ve wanted him to endure. He’d have rather taken it himself, Dean knew that. Had known it the instant Lilith had offered up the choice. So he’d known what Sam would do.

It hadn’t made watching it any easier. Especially since she’d all but forced it on him.

This time, Dean was thrilled to see Sam take the bitch out. He just wished it hadn’t come at so high a cost. _Again_.

First things first: find his brother. “Come on,” he said, taking off again. There’d been other cars in the parking lot where they’d brought the Impala in. Sam was bound to take one of them. Where, Dean didn’t know, but he had to figure out one step at a time.

He was going to find Sam. Period. And he was going to make sure his brother never, _ever_ , looked at him in fear again.

They’d gotten _past_ that, dammit, or so Dean had thought. Sam had made mistakes, Dean had made even worse mistakes, and they’d gotten back onto solid ground. Always backing the other, always standing side by side, not always agreeing but always supporting the other no matter what.

Then Lilith had shown up and erased over ten years of progress.

They got to the parking lot and Dean frantically searched around. There’d been four other cars, and now there were three. He thought the missing car might’ve been a Toyota, or a Hyundai, or something like that. So Sam had taken wheels, after all. But where?

“Where would Sam go?” Jody asked, apparently on the same wavelength.

“Where do demons go?” Bobby muttered, and Dean whirled on him, fire in his gaze. It was Castiel who got to him first, though, all but looming over Bobby enough to make the man back up.

“Sam Winchester is no demon. He is one of the best men I know with the brightest soul any human could hope to have. He is _good_.” He glanced at Dean, anger fading into regret and a bit of despair. “Which, apparently, he’s not as aware of as I had thought.”

Yeah, that made two of them. “Which car did he take?” he asked. “It might be enough for Jody to put out an APB.”

Jody snorted, making Dean glance at her. “You don’t need a damn APB. You need to think like Sam. Right here, right now. What would Sam do? Where would he go?”

Where _would_ Sam go to ground? For half a moment, Dean wondered if his brother would try and end himself. Eyes milky white like Lilith, blood on his face, Sam had looked every bit the monster that Bobby had seen him for.

It had only made Dean’s heart break all the more, because the kid had done it for him. He’d sacrificed himself, tossed his sobriety chip away, to protect _him_. God but he loved that kid so much sometimes it hurt.

But he had to believe that Sam wouldn’t pull the trigger himself, or if he was thinking about it, Dean could beat him to the punch. And that meant finding Sam first. Nowhere close by, obviously. They hadn’t even gotten a motel room, so he wasn’t going back for his things. And he couldn’t go far, with a hit like that. The higher up the hit, the faster he’d hit the bottom, and it’d be a bad low, too. Sam would know that, unfortunately. Sam would want somewhere to hole up. Somewhere safe.

Somewhere close.

Dean stiffened. “Where is he?” Castiel asked, reading him as well as he always did.

“Bunker,” he said. “It’s two hours out. He can make it before the worst of it sets in.”

“Worst of it?” Bobby raised an eyebrow. “So this isn’t the first time?”

It was too easy to forget, sometimes, that this wasn’t their Bobby, the man who’d helped hold Sam down when the worst of the detoxing had taken hold, the one who’d told Dean to man up in order to save Sam. This Bobby already had issues with Sam and this would only add fuel to the fire.

Fortunately, Jody spoke up first, but she surprised even Dean. “No, it’s not, but that doesn’t matter. You ever buried yourself at the bottom of a bottle? That morning after, that’s about to happen about three million times over. Finding Sam sorta takes priority right now. He won’t be fit to drive, so I think Dean’s spot on: he’ll head to the bunker.” She glanced at Dean, making a face. “After that, though, I don’t know. And from what I understand, his head’s not going to be the clearest.”

So not only did she know about the demon blood detoxing, but she knew about the hallucinations, too. Dean had never told her, so he had to assume Sam had. But when the hell had _that_ conversation happened?

“Let’s go,” Castiel urged, and Dean forced himself to move. Bobby and Jody headed for his truck around the time Dean slid behind the wheel. Castiel slid next to him in the passenger seat, and it felt so odd, to have anyone other than Sam sitting there, that he just paused for a moment.

Castiel turned and read his face. “I know,” was all he said.

He always did. Dean slid the car out of the parking spot and shot off down the road.

They made it back in ridiculous time, and Dean was fairly certain Jody had something to do with that, because there were always cops out, always. But the roads had been clear and he’d gunned it a little harder.

Still, when he pulled up to the bunker, the little Toyota he remembered having glanced at sat in front of the door. It was also still running, lights on, and the driver’s door flung open. Not too far from it was a small puddle of what looked like bloody vomit.

“Sam!” Dean shouted, glancing around. There was no response. He had to assume Sam had made it safely inside.

Castiel was already hurrying into the bunker. Dean raced behind him and slid to a stop at the top of the stairs. His ears craned to hear anything that would tell him where Sam was. Where was his kid?

“Sam!” he called again. “Sammy!”

Nothing. “Cas,” he said, a little desperately.

“He’s here,” Castiel said. “But I don’t know where. His soul is a mess.”

Something twisted inside of his chest. “From the demon blood?” If it had compromised Sam…

But Castiel shook his head. “No, not like that. It’s in turmoil. There’s…a lot of things I haven’t seen in it for some time now.” He made a face. “Self-loathing, guilt, and shame make the soul dim, leave it covered in a sort of oily substance. I don’t know how else to describe it to you.”

“And that’s Sam?” Dean asked, a sinking feeling in his stomach. If Sam had just waited, if he’d had a chance to talk to the kid—

He could find him and talk to him now.

Castiel nodded, peering ahead at nothing. “Down the south halls,” he said at last, and Dean took off down the stairs.

He turned around a few rooms, considered one of the reference rooms, then discarded it. No book was going to help Sam now. The supply room had no Sam in it, and neither did the weapons room. Sam's room had its door open and the lights on in the bathroom, showing a bloody and wet sink where Sam had clearly been. So not too far behind his brother. He made his way back to the hallway and kept going.

No other doors said this was where Sam had been until he got further down. The laundry room, of all places, was open, and Dean glanced inside. No Sam, but a pile of spilled towels made him pause. It was the rag pile, old towels and shirts that weren’t good for anything but cleaning up messes or to act as makeshift bandages. The hell would he have wanted with them?

“Sam?” he called again. Nothing gave away Sam’s position in the laundry room, so he headed back out to the hall.

And stopped. Because there _was_ a sound, a softer sound that made his ears try and catch more of it. What was it? Too soft to be a human voice, too clanky to be anything but metal. And it was coming from up ahead. “The hell?” he muttered.

He was halfway down the hall when his eyes caught sight of the dungeon door, shut as it usually was. But everything suddenly made sense in an absolutely horrific way, and he raced down the hall to the dungeon door. “Sam!” he yelled, even as he tried the handle. Locked. It was never locked unless they had something inside, and there shouldn’t have been anyone inside.

But the dungeon was the only room in the place that didn’t have things to break, the only room that came close to matching Bobby’s panic room. Dean felt something slither inside of him and tighten his chest muscles to the point of pain. “Sammy!” he yelled again.

There it was, the clinking sound of before, and he knew it was chains rattling. He scrambled to get the small window open to peer inside. Dark hair hung, bent over a curled-up figure, long legs pulled up against a body that was trembling hard enough to be visible. Sam’s wrists were both encased in manacles, and Dean could see white cloth sticking out from the shackles. Rags to keep his wrists from bleeding when his body would flail around.

God _dammit_. “Sam, open the door,” Dean called through the door. Sam flinched but didn’t answer. God only knew what he was seeing. “Sam!”

“You found him,” Castiel said, hurrying down the hall. He frowned at the dungeon door and peered past Dean inside. He froze a moment later, then shut his eyes tight. “Of course,” he murmured.

“Get the door open, now,” Dean told him. He got an incredulous look for his efforts, and Dean just glared back. “Cas, I’m not joking.”

“I can’t,” Castiel said, shaking his head. “Dean, there’s Enochian wards on the door and in the room. I helped you put them up, remember? Sam kept asking me to double-check his Enochian but it was always flawless.”

That made Dean pause for a myriad number of reasons. “Sam knows Enochian?” was what he finally settled on.

Castiel just sighed. “He was down in the Cage, surrounded by nothing but archangels. What do you think they spoke, Mandarin?”

Well that made an ugly sort of sense. One that made Dean wish he’d never asked Sam to do the Enochian parts of spells and wards. He was also vaguely irritated that he’d taught Castiel snark, since it was currently being tossed his way.

“Blow the door down, then.”

Castiel gave Dean something that looked an awful lot like one of Sam’s bitchfaces, and when the hell had Cas picked up all of their bad habits? “I _can’t_. That door won’t move for me, even if I were fully powered up with grace. There’s no way to open the door without a key.”

Key? “Key?” he asked, then held up his hand before Castiel could respond as a memory flowed in. Sam had showed him where all the spare keys were, and had even held up a plain, thick skeleton key, telling him, _This is the dungeon key so don’t take it off the ring or we’ll be screwed, are you listening, Dean?  
_

Oh he’d been listening all right. He ran back down the hallway to the library, looking for the right bookshelf. To the right of magic, to the left of the creepy crawlies, behind the maps. The panel came down and Dean dumped the entire box of keys on the table, sending them flying in various directions. He didn’t care. He’d sort them back later.

There, the big skeleton key that felt kind of rusty in his hands. He tore back down the hallway just as the door above opened. “Did you find him? Dean!” Jody called. She’d forgive him for ignoring her. Probably.

Castiel was at the window when Dean flew around the corner. The angel's voice was soft and pleading as he called for Sam. “Sam, please, get yourself out of the chains. Do you have the key for them? Sam, talk to me. It’s Castiel.”

“Move,” Dean said shortly, and Castiel jumped back to make room.

“He won’t answer me. I’ve been trying to reach him since you left.”

The key turned the lock slowly, enough to make his teeth grind at the speed, but the heavy tumblers finally gave up the fight and the lock parted ways with the door. He tugged the heavy thing open and hurried inside.

He had a brother to help. And this time, this time he wasn’t leaving Sam alone, locked in like an animal.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks all for the kind notes - I'm glad I wasn't the only one hoping to see some season 4 resolution with our season 4 big bad returning!
> 
> As always, mucking with canon. Spoilers up through 15x08 for certain characters that return canonically, so mind the tags and your spoilers if that sort of thing applies to you. Otherwise, have a serious heap of angst.

The road had started offering up ghosts before Sam had even reached the bunker.

Unlike the last time he’d detoxed, there’d been far more people for him to see, staring him down with their bloody visages, disappointment and anger and so ashamed of him. It had been everything Sam could do to keep himself on the road.

Mom. Charlie. Bobby. Dad. Jess and Sarah and Kevin and Missouri and so many others. All of them glaring at him like the filth he was. He’d glanced in the rearview mirror and found eyes still white but starting to flicker to black. He hadn’t looked after that.

He’d managed to get to the front of the bunker just as the first stomach rolls began. He’d stumbled out and heaved, bringing up blood and bile. The next stomach cramp would be worse and it would probably fling him everywhere. And that was why he’d ultimately decided to come back to the bunker. He didn’t want to soil their home with his evil, his _wrong_ , but it was the only place that had anything close to Bobby’s old panic room.

Maybe he should’ve just let Bobby fill him with lead. It would’ve hurt less than the disappointment and disgust Dean would level at him for the next who knew how long. The distrust, unable to believe Sam in whatever he did or said.

Tears stung his eyes as he made his way inside, feet stumbling down the last few stairs when they’d seemingly disappeared beneath him. The hard landing at the bottom gave him some clarity in the pain. Enough to remind him why he’d come back to the bunker in the first place.

This time, he was going to be prepared. Hindsight and all that.

He moved as fast as he could, knowing this moment of sanity wasn’t going to last. There were the rags in the laundry room to cushion his wrists and keep him from getting bloodied when he got yanked around in the cuffs. Not because he particularly cared about getting hurt, but Dean would glance at the marks on his wrists and make… _that_ face. The less physical reminders he had for everyone, the better.

He thought about a bottle of water, but as he backtracked to the kitchen, he froze. Dean stood in front of him, arms crossed. “There a particular reason you’re going anywhere except where you need to be right now?” his brother asked.

There was no way his brother could’ve beaten him back, could’ve been at the bunker already. But…he didn’t know. He couldn’t be sure. Hesitantly he took a step backwards.

Dean smirked, but it held no mirth. “You can’t even tell if I’m a hallucination or not. Wow. That hit fast, huh?”

Shame flooded through Sam and made his cheeks flush. “You’re not real,” he said, hedging a bet, hoping that he was right, that Dean wouldn’t stoop to this level of cruel. Not needlessly.

The smirk only broadened. “Yeah, but you thought I was for a minute. What does that say about you?”

He needed to get locked down, now. Sam turned and immediately headed down the hallway.

The hallway that was now devoid of lights. Sam froze. The lights were on, they were _on_. He strode down the hall in the dark, trying desperately to get his vision to clear. Or his brain. Whatever. His hand knocked into a wall and it touched something cold and wet.

He jerked away and heard a laugh echo around him. “Oh, come on, Sammy,” Lilith crooned somewhere behind him. He spun around but still couldn’t see anything. “You know you want another taste.”

The smell of sulfur was everywhere, now that he took a sharp inhale, and Sam frantically wiped his hand on his pants. It smeared red, he was covered in it, just like his face and neck, and he ran down the halls. He found his room, the lights on somehow again but the least of his concerns, and ran straight for the mirror in the bathroom.

Blood covered his face and rolled straight down his neck. His eyes were as black as night, and his hands were bloodstained, too. “Oh god,” he choked, and he dove for the faucet.

The basin was red by the time he was done, and it still hadn’t taken the blood off of his hands. His face and neck looked less ghastly, but the hands just wouldn’t come clean.

“Of course they won’t. They never do.”

Sam flinched and shut his eyes at the sound of his mom’s voice. “They never have,” she continued. “Did you think that the Trials would, what, cleanse you? There’s no amount of holy that can do that, honey. I’m sorry. I wish I could’ve told you that before I died. Again. At least this last time wasn’t your fault.”

He glanced up into his room, anguished. She stood, looking the same as she had when they’d found her outside the cabin, an almost sympathetic look on her face. “Well,” she said, and she narrowed her gaze at him. “Not completely your fault. You were the one who thought Jack was perfectly safe, and how far did that get you?”

“How far did it get _me_?”

Jack’s voice from behind made him whirl around. Jack stared at him as if he were a stranger, and a horrific one at that. “You lied to me about my father, my _real_ father,” he seethed. “And then you tried to lock me away in a box. A _box_! The same one that you wouldn’t dare lock Dean in, and it was a good enough coffin for me. And you told me you loved me?”

“I did,” Sam whispered, heart breaking. “I do. Jack, I didn’t—”

“Save it,” Jack said. “You kept telling me that Lucifer was so evil, so wrong, and what are you? How are you any better?”

“He’s not,” came Charlie’s voice, and of course she was next to Mom. Her blood-spattered shirt only highlighted her pale face. “He let me die. It really should’ve been you up on that pyre, y’know. Dean was right.”

He couldn’t listen to this. He couldn’t. It just cracked more open inside of him, shattered what little was left of his heart. Sam pushed himself away from the sink, stumbled past his mom and the woman who’d been his little sister, grabbed the rags he’d dropped in the hallway, and made his way to the dungeon.

The door shut with a heavy bang behind him but it left him alone, something he was grateful for at that particular moment. It wouldn’t last, but he’d selfishly take it. And hopefully he’d be better off by the time Dean really came home to the bunker.

His fingers fumbled over the cuffs. After some trial and error, he managed to get them secured around the rags and wrists. They weren’t perfect, but they’d have to do. Then it was a matter of settling in to wait. Which he’d be doing an awful lot of.

Who knew how long this was going to last. He’d been down in the panic room for only a handful of days the first time, so he couldn’t really use that as a baseline. The second time, after Famine, it’d been close to a week before he’d knocked on the door and asked to take a shower. He still remembered the fear of Dean not letting him out, a fear that had been assuaged the instant Dean had unlocked the door.

He wasn’t sure if Dean would be so willing to open the door this time.

“Would you?”

Oh god no, please, not yet. But there was Dean, leaning against the other wall, anger in his eyes. “You try having a brother who’s addicted to _demon blood_. Man, that doesn’t end. I thought it had but that’s a stain you just can’t get out.”

“It’s not like that,” Sam protested, unable to just sit by and listen. “I didn’t want it—”

“Sure you didn’t,” Dean drawled before snorting derisively. “You barely fought it. The minute you smelled her blood it all came back, didn’t it? You can’t purge that. You can’t get rid of that. You’ve never been able to get rid of it, and you never will.”

Tears burned in his eyes. “I didn’t want it, I swear I didn’t.”

“Did you actually think you could get clean with the Trials? With helping me fight against the Mark? Did you think any of it made a lick of a difference? You’re still wrong. You’re still tainted. And you’re still getting everyone we’ve ever cared about killed. I’ve spent years trying to ignore it, pretend I could wipe that slate clean, try to look the other way. But I just can’t. And I’m sick of trying, just to spare your feelings.”

There was nothing Sam could say to that. He pulled his legs in and buried his head in his knees. It only helped marginally to not look at his brother. The hallucination of his brother.

Was there really any difference, in the end, between a hallucination and his real brother? Dean had said “blank slate” before and then just dragged the demon blood back up when he’d been possessed by a cursed penny a few years later. It had to still be on his mind. How did something like that leave someone’s mind?

“I tried,” he whispered. His skin burned and he winced. He’d forgotten the burning feeling. He’d forgotten a lot over the last ten years. He jerked as it suddenly shot through his spine and down his tailbone.

“You tried what? To not want it? To not be wrong? How do you do that?”

His fingers trembled and he grasped the top of his knees to quell the shaking. He wasn’t sure how to do that. He’d been trying for years with no success.

“I just wanted you to not drink it,” Sam murmured. “That’s all. I didn’t want you to do this.”

“Didn’t want me to hone in on your favorite snack, you mean. Well, there’s still some left on your hands, if you want a taste.”

How had blood gotten on his hands? He didn’t remember. He didn’t remember anything beyond Dean’s damning words, disgusted voice, and the trembling that had moved beyond his hands to his entire body. He shut his eyes against the nausea that came out of nowhere.

A snort. “I don’t even know why I’m here. You know the routine at this point, and how sad is that, huh? After all these years, nothing changes. I thought they had, but you’re here again. It’s just exhausting, Sam. It really is. I’ll see you in a week. Or however long this one takes. Then…we can talk about letting you out. Maybe.”

The dungeon door opened, hinges loud, and Sam buried his face even further into his knees. It was better than watching Dean leave him in there alone. Again.

Something pulled at his chains and oh god, not yet, he didn’t want to get thrown around yet, please no—

“Hey, hey, easy, Sammy. Easy.”

“The key, Dean, give me the key. I can’t break the cuffs with the wards.”

Pressure on his wrists eased. Something familiar and warm gently pulled him from his curled-up position. Green and blue eyes both met his with soft smiles.

He’d never hallucinated Castiel before. He didn’t want to hear it now. Not with Dean beside him. Not from the two beings who mattered more than anyone else. “No,” he mumbled and tried to pull away. “No, pl’se.”

But they wouldn’t stop, instead pulling him up to some form of standing. They headed for the door and the hallway beyond had icicles forming on the ceiling, frost on the walls. Sam stared, terror stealing his breath. His shaky exhale came out misty and cold.

“Bring him in, boys,” Lucifer called from somewhere ahead in the blackness, and Sam frantically tried to pull away. It’d been Alastair last time but he knew now that Alastair was a kitten compared to Lucifer. He knew all too well what Lucifer was capable.

He snarled and tore free, earning him startled curses as he hit the floor hard. The hallway’s darkness revealed red, knowing eyes, and a bright grin below them. “Come on, Sam,” Lucifer cajoled. “I’ve missed you.”

“Stay ‘way from me,” Sam gasped, crawling away. Hands tried to grab him and he wasn’t going, he wasn’t, he was out, he wasn’t going back to Lucifer. “You’re dead, you’re dead—”

“Oh Sammy,” Lucifer said, shaking his head. “Don’t you get it? I’m not ever going to die. Not to you. Now, where was my angel blade? It’ll make the nicest sizzling sound with all that demon blood in your veins. I can’t _wait_ to make you retaste it. Or maybe you could drink some of my blood. See what the mix does. Explosive little cocktail, I’m betting.”

Cold hands caught hold of him and he screamed, desperately kicking and trying to get free. The Cage was only so big and Lucifer could tighten the size at any time he wanted, he could let Sam wander for years without any sound or touch or sight. He could make Sam watch Dean live blissfully without him, free of his burden. He could leave Sam so touch-starved, so desperate for anything, that Sam would beg for Lucifer to take him, hurt him, anything so long as he could feel something.

Screams resounded around him, cacophonous and full of fear, while others shouted. And Lucifer lowered his hand to rest on Sam’s head, red eyes suddenly blue, and then everything went mercifully black.

* * *

Well, that could’ve gone better.

Dean blearily wiped his face and gazed down at Sam. His brother was, at least, sleeping for the moment, thanks to Castiel. He wished it hadn’t taken some of Cas’s angelic mojo to knock him out, but Sam had been fighting them tooth and nail, more afraid than Dean had ever seen him, screaming and babbling about Lucifer. Begging Lucifer to stay away, that he was dead, he didn’t want any blood, please don’t touch him, don’t leave him alone in the dark, just one touch please he’d do anything—

Castiel putting him out had been a mercy at that point.

They’d been able to move him to Dean’s room where he was now, sprawled out across Dean’s bed. He’d been mostly devoid of blood on his face and neck but Dean had spent some time cleaning him off anyway, combating the fever and covering him when he shivered. So far, they hadn’t had to restrain him, and Dean was _not_ looking forward to that.

A quiet knock on the door made him look up. Castiel came in with two mugs of what smelled promisingly of coffee, Jody right behind him. She had her own mug along with a plate of what looked like cookies. “Thanks,” Dean said, voice rough.

Jody just guided Castiel to sit down next to Dean and leaned against the wall. Her eyes went over Sam as he twitched on the bed, and her face softened even as she winced in sympathy. “How is he?” she asked quietly.

Dean shrugged. “No better, no worse. So far, I’m surprised by how well he’s doing.”

Jody raised an eyebrow. “Well, he’s warm, cared for, and in a space I’m sure he knows as safe. From what I understand, that’s not how this usually goes.”

It was Dean’s turn to wince, but not in sympathy. “He told you,” he said. It wasn’t a question.

Jody shrugged. “Some. When you were both missing. He came and stayed with me for a bit, wound up getting very drunk and spilling a lot of things. Besides how much he missed you. He thought you were dead and gone, you know. He thought you were in Heaven. And he was determined to leave you be, but that didn’t mean it was easy for him.”

Dean blinked. He’d gotten some of this from Sam, over the years, what had really happened while they’d been in Purgatory, but nothing straight-forward like this. “He talked about his nightmares,” she continued. “He mentioned some things about the Cage. The demon blood addiction, the panic room. Things I don’t think he’d ever told anybody else. I think the loneliness just got to him, being the last one left. He wanted someone to hear it. Needed someone to, really.”

“Does he remember telling you?” Castiel asked in the wake of Dean not being able to find his voice.

Jody’s lips turned up a little. “He remembered some, at least. Enough to come in the next morning, face all red, stammering out apologies. I told him it was fine. I was honored, actually, to be a sound board.” Her smile fell a little. “Even if what he told me gave _me_ a few nightmares. I haven’t told him that, and don’t you dare either.”

No, Dean understood that. Sam had told him a glimmer of what had happened in the Cage once, after Dean had pressed, and it had been enough to give Dean nightmares of his own. He wondered if that was why Sam hadn’t told him anything else.

They sat for a bit more, watching over Sam. Sam flinched and tightened his fists as if aiming to defend himself, and Dean half-rose out of his chair to settle him. After a moment, though, Sam’s face evened out, and with a shudder he seemed to go back under.

Who knew what was going on in his head. It hadn’t been a happy scene that they’d walked in on when they’d gotten him out of the dungeon, that was for sure.

Jody seemed to want to say something, then her eyes cut over to Castiel and she stopped. Dean could take a hint, and fortunately, so could Cas. “I’ll be back,” was all the angel said, and he left.

Dean turned to Jody. “Well?”

“Do you want me to stay?”

That wasn’t the question he’d anticipated out of her. “Sam would probably appreciate it. I know I would. You’ve got the girls to get back to—”

“They’ll be fine,” Jody said firmly. “I’d rather make sure you’re both okay. I don’t know how bad this is going to get.”

“Me either,” Dean confessed. “I know how bad it was the first two times but it wasn’t with blood as potent as Lilith’s. Then again, he had a lot of it the last time, and not as much this time. So it’s anyone’s guess.”

“You still haven’t explained why he wound up dosed with demon blood again.”

That still hurt to think about. “To save me,” Dean said quietly. Sam twitched again and then went still. “Lilith was going to force it down one of our throats. Sam took the bullet.” All because of Chuck. Dean couldn’t deal with him soon enough.

“He didn’t want you to know what it felt like,” Jody said knowingly.

It was an easy out but Dean couldn’t let the half-truth hang. He owed Sam more than that. “That, and I’m sure he believed all of her garbage about being evil and wrong and whatever else.”

She hummed like she’d expected that and left it there. It wasn’t like she didn’t know where they’d found Sam: she’d met them coming out of the dungeon and had hurried to open doors, get bowls of water, anything they needed.

It burned inside of Dean, how easily he’d left Sam alone in the panic room. Not once, but twice. He’d been drowning during both instances himself, first with what he saw as betrayal, the second as empty as Famine had claimed he was. It was only hindsight that had let him see it from Sam’s point of view: of being locked in a room, treated like a criminal instead of family, aching and hurting and so alone. He’d never been conscious when Dean had come in to help wash him up, bandage wounds. It had never been easy to do, and far easier to leave before Sam woke up.

Lilith’s taunting words about Sam being evil had struck a chord in Sam that Dean hadn’t expected, not after all these years. But it meant, even worse, that _Sam_ had held enough belief in what she said for it to hit home, and that meant it hadn’t ever really gone away. There was still a part of Sam that believed he was evil, wrong. Even after all these years, after everything they’d been through. After everything Sam had given, for him to still believe that…it made something inside of Dean break.

He wished he could go back in time and do it right. Stay with Sam. Or drag Sam up to a real bed and let him actually rest. Just make sure the kid wasn’t ever alone.

Dean watched as Sam’s body suddenly went rigid and he cried out in pain. In an instant Dean had one side of Sam, Jody the other, and Castiel raced back in.

They managed to keep Sam pinned to the bed, and when it was over, every single one of Sam’s muscles quivered in the aftermath. A trail of blood ran from his nose and Dean gently mopped it away.

Jody was panting a little. “That’s not the worst of it, is it?” she asked.

Dean pursed his lips. “No. It’s not.” Hell was still to come. And the thought of Sam having to do it, to go through it, _again_ , was more than he could take. He’d never wanted Sam to have to endure this again. Let alone for him.

This time, Sam wasn’t going to be left alone down in a hole. And he was going to know it, too.

“I’ll see what I can find in the medical supplies,” Castiel said. “And maybe the rare herbs. There might be something I can use. Maybe a spell.”

It reminded Dean that he wasn’t the only one who might want to do things a different way. Someone else felt as guilty as he did. It only made him all the more determined.

“Do that,” he said, catching Castiel’s attention. “Poke at Rowena, too. She might have some ideas.”

Sam whimpered and Dean immediately forgot about anything else. A jerk, a second jerk, and Sam came off the bed completely and hovered in the air, screaming out in pain.

Yeah. It was going to be a long night. But he wasn’t going anywhere.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for your love! I'm glad this has resonated so well with you, and I hope this final chapter helps with the heaping of angst y'all have been wading through.

There were flashes of lots of moments. Lots of bad moments.

Lucifer beckoned in the dark abyss, eyes red and smile full of teeth. Mom turned him away. Jack was repulsed and then dead, his fault, just like Charlie and Mom and Jess Sarah Missouri—

Dean. Dean Dean Dean.

The pain crested, tearing his veins open, setting him on fire and he burned while Lucifer laughed. Light flared, too bright, making him blind, his eyeballs melting, skull fracturing open. Help, someone help, oh please help—

_No one helps a monster. You did this. You deserve this._

Lilith smiled and offered him a flask. Dean turned away and left him, Dean stood before him with disgust, Dean lifted a gun and put it to his head and pulled the trigger and—

Sam jerked and the dark abyss faded into the warmth of a desk light. Posters. Haphazard clothes. Dean’s room.

Slowly he let his eyes continue roaming. The mattress beneath him felt real, including and up to the sweaty feeling he always got from the memory foam. There was a towel over the lamp, dulling the light and casting a warm glow over the room. The door hung ajar, letting in the barest amount of light from the hallway.

It was enough to let him see Castiel sitting in a chair, head tipped back against the wall, eyes closed. Jody sat next to him, head on his shoulder, clearly asleep.

And beside the bed, lost in thought, was Dean, eyes focused on a distant point. There were dark circles under his eyes, and his hair looked like he’d run his hands through it a time or twenty-five. He looked exhausted.

Sam began to rise on instinct, then fell back onto the bed, hissing as every nerve lit up. Oh god that hurt. He’d forgotten how much it hurt. It felt like every one of his veins had been split open, burned away by the demon blood.

Oh god, the demon blood.

Even as memory came flooding back, awareness and shame creeping back in, Dean was there, a hand on Sam’s shoulder. He still looked like he was a million miles away. “Easy, Sam,” he murmured. “You’re all right. Just a nightmare.”

“Not really,” Sam said, voice like gravel. Dean actually focused on him, eyes widening a little.

“Sam?”

“Unfortunately.”

Dean huffed a small laugh but it wasn’t bitter, and Sam watched in surprise as his brother honest to god smiled at him. Still hallucinating, then. As if Dean’s bedroom hadn’t been an indicator of that.

Jody and Castiel being there was just…weird, though. And not doing anything. That made even less sense. He’d never hallucinated Jody before.

“Sam?” Dean asked again, smile falling a little into a concerned frown. “What do you need?”

“To stop hallucinating,” he muttered. Fire shot through him again and he jerked a little, wincing. It wasn’t as bad as he remembered, though. The long drive back had been…bad. He wondered how long he’d been under.

A hand rested against his forehead, pulling him back to the visage of Dean, still frowning a little. “A little warm, but not bad,” he finally said. “Let’s see about actually getting some fluids into you that don’t come out of an IV.”

He started to move away and Sam suddenly reached out and caught hold of his sleeve. “No, wait, I—”

Dean immediately turned back around. “Hey, hey, easy, not going anywhere,” he promised. “Look, whatever you’re seeing, it’s not real, okay? I’m here, Cas and Jody are here. Nobody else.”

Even as Sam tried desperately to come to grips that maybe this wasn’t a hallucination, that somehow he was in Dean’s room with Dean right there, Dean took hold of his hand and pressed his thumb down into the middle. The pain was sharp and familiar, and it brought tears to Sam’s eyes for numerous reasons.

Dean didn’t let go. “You’re here,” he said. “You’re not down there. You’re here with me. And he’s dead, Sammy. He’s not coming back.”

Slowly Sam nodded. Dean carefully waited until Sam let go before letting go himself. He headed to the nearby table and brought back a cup of water. Sam’s hands wrapped around it and his fingers trembled. His cheeks suddenly went hot as he wondered what he had to look like after who knew how long in the dungeon, dealing with the demon blood.

His stomach twisted. All those years sober, and they were worthless.

The cup slipped out of his hands after another painful jerk, but a steadier hand caught it and brought it back up. “I got it,” Dean murmured. “I got you.”

The water felt amazing going down, better than the rancid taste of the blood. Once it was done Dean set it aside, and Sam expected him to gather Jody and Castiel and leave. Or go elsewhere himself under some sort of pretense of necessity. Or maybe sit and stare at Sam and wait for the apology that Sam owed him.

He did none of those things. Dean merely sat down on the bed beside Sam. “You hungry at all?” Dean asked quietly. “Broth, smoothie, veggie bacon?”

“No, I…” and he couldn’t find the words. Not when he couldn’t seem to understand why nothing was going the way he’d anticipated it going.

Dean didn’t say anything, just sat beside him, and Sam suddenly found his voice in the midst of Dean’s patience. “How long?” he asked.

“In the dungeon? An hour, maybe. Here? About four days,” Dean said. “You came to a lot faster than I thought.”

Even as Sam blinked, trying to understand what he was saying, Dean made a face, but it was clearly self-loathing. “Then again, it’s not like I have much of a baseline. I wasn’t down there with you, the other times. I should’ve been.”

“You shouldn’t have had to,” Sam argued, because his addiction had been his fault and no one else’s. He shouldn’t have had to suffer because of Sam’s mistakes.

His brother just shook his head. “Yeah, I should have. That’s what a brother does. Or what a brother should do.”

Maybe he was hallucinating after all. Because yeah, he’d like to think they’d grown up over the past who knew how many years of fighting evil and hurting each other in a myriad number of ways. They’d learned the hard way that they could only go forward if they had each other’s backs.

But this wasn’t something that Dean should ever forgive, and definitely wasn’t something that he’d thought Dean _could_ forgive. Dean had brought it up enough over the years to know what he thought of this mistake.

As Dean continued watching him with an even gaze, concern in the slight frown on his face, there was a part of Sam that figured that maybe, just maybe, this time _was_ different. Because he wasn’t sure he was hallucinating. Which meant Dean had not only come for him, but that Dean had immediately moved him out of the dungeon to here, his room. Somewhere safe.

The next jerk was less violent than the one before it, but Dean still moved as if to steady him. “I’m okay,” Sam said, and suddenly his throat closed up. His nose burned and his eyes with it, and he tried to tell his brother that he _was_ okay, tried to get anything out, but it hit him like a tidal wave. Exhaustion, pain, and what felt like forgiveness and love that he didn’t really deserve.

Dean had come for him, the guy with the demon blood. And he was still there.

He buried his face in his hand and tried to shift away when the first sob threatened to burst out of his throat. An arm tugged him in, firm and refusing to let him go, and Sam leaned his head into Dean’s chest and cried.

“I’m here, Sammy,” Dean promised, low and fervently. “I’m here. Not going anywhere.”

He believed him.

And for the first time since Lilith had held the blood out in front of him, he felt like he maybe he wasn’t going to lose everything he’d built towards. Maybe he wasn’t as lost himself as he’d thought.

Through it all, Dean held on firmly and kept murmuring reassurances, never once letting go.

* * *

It only took another day for Sam to get up and move around. He still shook, kitten-weak and clinging to walls to stay upright. Well, clinging to walls on one side. Dean was always on the other side, holding on tight.

He knew Sam still didn’t quite believe he was there, that he wasn’t going anywhere. That was fine. He was getting there. Every time Sam went to do something, every time he reached for water or tried to stand, Dean just made sure he was there. It gave him a chance to see if Sam was really okay, check his temperature, make sure he wasn’t overdoing it.

And slowly but surely the fear, the shame, the guilt in Sam’s eyes began to dissipate.

Sam had tried to ask about the days he’d missed, if he’d said anything. Dean just told him it was the usual, a few hallucinations, mostly his body trying to dispel the foreign substance.

He didn’t need to know about the nightmares they’d been privy to, of Sam crying out, of Lucifer and Dean and Castiel and Mom and Charlie and Jack all making some form of an appearance. Of Sam begging for forgiveness, of sobbing, of being sick and passing out so hard that Dean hadn’t been able to find a breath for a solid minute and a half.

Yeah. The less said about those days, the better.

Castiel made sure he was there, too, and Jody stayed close to provide support where she could. It never failed to make something inside of Dean’s chest twist in a very ugly fashion whenever he saw the relief on Sam’s face, knowing it was because the others hadn’t left. His little brother was blatantly grateful that they were still willing to be there.

They had a lot to earn back in terms of trust. But it was for a damn good reason. Sam had always been a good reason to do anything.

It was the second day of Sam being up that Bobby came in. Dean immediately stood up and between him and Sam, because while Sam wouldn’t say anything, there was no way Sam didn’t remember having a shotgun aimed at him. One glance back at Sam, sitting at the library table, proved that his brother’s face was pale and pained.

Castiel stood too, not even bothering trying to be subtle about it. Jody came to the bottom of the stairs, crossing her arms. “What do you want, Singer?” she asked coldly.

“Relax,” Bobby said, rolling his eyes. “I ain’t here to cause trouble. I actually came to bring something to help.”

If this had been their Bobby, Dean would’ve trusted him implicitly. This Bobby, not so much. Especially with his little brother. “Which would be?” Dean asked, not moving from his place in front of Sam.

Bobby stepped down the stairs and made his way over to Sam. Dean tensed, but a hand on his shoulder made him turn to where Sam had gotten to his feet. He got a look from Sam and a tightening of his brother’s hand. _It’s okay,_ came through loud and clear, and Dean pursed his lips. Fine, but he wasn’t going to be happy about it.

Sam kept his grip on Dean’s shoulder and waited beside him as Bobby approached. Bobby stopped about a foot away, whether in deference to the tension in the room, or because Dean hadn’t stopped glaring. If Bobby tried something, god help him, because Dean would stand by Sam’s side with no hesitation.

Fortunately, Bobby didn’t seem like he was looking to test Dean. “I got this,” Bobby said, and he handed out a dried flower. The head almost looked like a rose, and it was a deep red that hadn’t dried out.

Hesitantly Sam took it, but he looked more confused than anything else. “What is it?” he asked. “I, um, don’t recognize it.”

“That’s because it’s rare as hell,” Bobby said. “It’s a Middlemist’s Red flower. They’re pretty, they’re rare, but they’re also an alchemist’s favorite because they’re sort of a magical anticoagulant.”

Sam still looked puzzled. Dean felt much the same. “What does that do for Sam?”

In response, Bobby handed over a folded, very yellowed piece of paper. “It was an anti-poison spell,” he explained. “But what it really meant was that whatever liquid you fed the spell, it wouldn’t soak in. You’d just cough it back up. It works with all sorts of poisons. I have to imagine it’d work with other liquids, too.”

Sam froze, and the flower trembled in his hand. “Then no one can use it against you again,” Bobby said, but his voice was quieter. “You or Dean.”

Sometimes, it was easy to see the differences between this Bobby and the man who’d all but raised them. And sometimes they looked, and acted, about the same. Dean swallowed hard. “Thank you,” he said.

Bobby gave a short nod. “Figured it was the least I could do. No one deserves that sort of abuse, especially when it was taken on the chin to save family.”

“It was, yeah,” Dean said, even as Sam began to reply. He glanced at Sam and found his little brother gazing at him, eyes a little wide in shock. “And I wish like hell he’d let me take it. Because he didn’t deserve it.”

He hadn’t deserved any of the detoxes, but especially not this last one. Not when he’d broken years of sobriety just to save Dean from suffering the same fate.

Bobby didn’t stay too much longer. Sam immediately started looking the spell over, then winced and rubbed at his eyes. “Still too much?” Dean asked.

“A little,” Sam admitted. “Getting better, though.” He paused and glanced at Dean. “Thank you,” he said softly. “For…for everything.”

_I’m sorry_ and _I’m here_ and _You’re not evil_ and _I love you_ all passed on Dean’s tongue before he found the one he wanted. “Always, Sammy.”

Sam’s smile was a little watery but all genuine. Dean patted him on the shoulder before nudging him back into the chair. “I’ll read the spell over. We can run it past Rowena too, see what your mentor says.” No condemnation, no dismissal. Just there to help and be with Sam.

“She’ll probably be jealous,” Sam told him, but he kept smiling, like he couldn’t believe he’d been lucky enough to have Dean by his side, to have Dean as his brother.

Dean could relate. Because a guy willing to get poisoned, willing to risk his soul by exposing himself to evil, thinking he was tainting himself by doing so but doing it anyway, all to save his big brother?

Yeah. He was lucky to have Sam as his brother. And he would make damn sure Sam knew it.

And he’d make sure Chuck knew it, too. Because he wasn’t going to lose Sam to another one of Chuck’s schemes to end the world. Not while he was still breathing.

_I dare you to try again, Chuck,_ Dean thought as Castiel came over to look at the spell, as Jody rested a hand on Sam's shoulder. _Because there's nothing that will ever make me turn on my brother. Not ever again._


End file.
